Medical and hospital beds for patient support are known in the art. Typically, such patient support apparatuses are used to provide a support surface for treatment, recuperation or rest of patients. Many such patient support apparatuses include a frame, a support surface held by the frame, a mattress, siderails configured to block egress of a patient from the mattress, and a controller configured to control one or more features of the bed.
In order to accommodate various needs and treatments, medical and hospital beds are required to be versatile and must be articulated as much as possible. Traditionally, when a bed is positioned or articulated to meet a specific treatment or patient need, access to the controller of the bed can be an issue. Often, access to the controller is encumbered by other parts of the bed, and can often only be achieved with difficulty due to the relative position of the health care provider, and therefore clear vision of the controls or status of bed functions by the health care provider can be compromised.
The frame of a medical bed can have various positions such as lowered near to the floor to assist the patient in exiting the bed, raised, in a chair position with the contraction of some of its components or various other configurations, depending on the specifications of the bed frame. In one example, one lift mechanism may tilt a back section so that the patient's back and head may be raised, while another lift mechanism may adjust a knee section of the mattress support to raise the patient's knees. Furthermore, in many adjustable hospital beds, the entire mattress supporting structure may be tilted or canted to either the Trendelenburg position (head down, feet up) or to the reverse Trendelenburg position (head up, feet down). The bed is typically adjusted to the Trendelenburg position when the patient goes into shock, whereas the reverse Trendelenburg position is employed for drainage. In order to perform all these and other movements, a control module which can be accessed by the patient or a third party is required. There are several advantages in having this control module visible and accessible at all times for the intended operator. It should also be attached to the bed to avoid being misplaced. As the bed can be moved, the control module must travel with the bed. An ideal location for the control module is at the foot end of the bed since it is often situated closer to the door of the room. The health care provider also often stands at the foot end of the bed to communicate with the patient. The foot end of the bed is also a good location for the control module in cases where the patient suffers from a highly contagious ailment or is vulnerable to infections because the direct proximal interactions between the patient and others are limited. This allows the health care provider to adjust or change the position of the patient, verify the status of the bed or patient, all while being able to communicate with the patient. In conventional known medical bed designs, where the foot section of the bed must be lowered, the health care provider might lose sight of the control module and see his/her accessibility thereto reduced because of the angle and relative position of the foot section. In such a case, it is also possible that the health care provider may not be able to use or control some or all the functions of the bed when the control module is situated too close to the floor or in a position in which it is ergonomically difficult to properly operate.
For example, published U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/731,720 (Publication No. 2004/0177445), now U.S. Pat. No. 6,957,461, discloses a hospital bed which includes a frame, a deck including a seat section and a foot section movable relative to the seat section. The disclosed bed further includes a mechanism that controls movement of the foot section relative to the seat section. The bed includes a footboard or second barrier comprising a modular control unit for controlling the automated features of a hospital bed and a base. The modular control unit includes a support panel slidably coupled to the base. The modular control unit has a control panel pivotably coupled to the support panel which is rotatable between two positions, a use position and a storage position. The disclosed control panel has a series of buttons for controlling some functions of a hospital bed. The disclosed bed requires a support panel attached to the base of the bed by a sliding movement, limiting the types of beds it can be attached to. The modular control unit in the disclosure is also only pivotally adjustable to two positions, a use position and a storage position, and is not always readily accessible or visible since its position is interdependent on the position of the base of the footboard or the second barrier. This disclosed modular control unit is primarily designed to be operated by the patient.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/040,272 (Publication No. 2005/0188462), now U.S. Pat. No. 7,200,882, discloses a controller embedded in a siderail of a medical bed, or in a means mounted to the bed for inhibiting egress from the bed, but with the limitation that the inhibiting means being movable between a raised position and a lowered position. This application is limited to a controller which is pivotally connected to the siderail (or “inhibiting means”)and is able to pivot around a single axis. Also, the disclosed controller only has two stationary positions: the stored position and the deployed position, often resulting in a poor ergonomic position for operation of the controller. In addition, the controller changes position when the structure to which it is attached is moved, therefore diminishing the accessibility and visibility of the control module.
Therefore there is a need for a new ergonomic control apparatus for use with a patient support apparatus which overcomes the disadvantages identified in the prior art.
This background information is provided to reveal information believed by the applicant to be of possible relevance to the present invention. No admission is necessarily intended, nor should be construed, that any of the preceding information constitutes prior art against the present invention.